Post #13

I was, in my youth, something of a traveler. And so the story I'm about to tell you comes from someone who is able to judge things for the most part correctly. If you have had any experience traveling, and if you had happened to speak the language of the place you were traveling in--or simply had a friendly curiosity--well then you'll probably understand. I've said maybe a thousand times before, that really we have no recourse, and really anything goes. Slave as we might, I said, slave as we might, we will never see those heavenly lights. Only the dark ones will ever appear to us, and beautiful as they may be.... When we do nothing. Say it again, if we do nothing.

I saw a woman wearing the pelvis-bone of a horse for a necklace. I will not lie and try to claim that such accessories were fashionable at the time. Far from it, you yourselves could have not been more schocked than I was then. She was old, and quite ugly, and wore nothing but an unfortunate neglige. Becuase I shared with her even my most treasured secrets, she appeared to me as my own kin. But so many years is a long time to talk about the weather and eventually she had the desire to discover whether princes really exist. God grant her the best luck. I stayed, not really of my own volition, but because I was so much younger than she, and, afraid that I would squeal, she had yes tied me up. When the old crone arrived she assured me that eventually another pretty young lady would come along. Sure enough, when I was too old and too awkward, another unanounced princess showed up--they really seem to appreciate nothing. She was so old that she had teeth missing, and she insisted on trying to kiss with those deflated lips. What could I say to her? I had recently developed a theory about crickets, but all that was simply nonsense. I'm glad that I just sat so quietly in the corner. It gave me time to ignore her. Eventually she died. I was an old man by then, and so wild looking that no person would willingly approach me, when the old hag showed up and once again promised fresh virgin pricesses.

But I died and decended into hell before she ever arrived. There I was allowed to do only what I really wanted to do, so I spent my days lamenting all the days I would eventually spend lamenting. But hell is not so bad; we all call each other 'poet', and are convinced that everything is beautiful. In hell everything is beautiful, we can really be ourselves here, we are naked and godless--at every beginning tiny bells ring out, and angels, who look very happy, are scratched on the walls. Before long you forget yourself. On history day we are apes. What a good thing to say. On history day we are apes. On history day we are apes. On history day we are apes.